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Comment by lovemenot | Hacker News Reader

Almost every evening a couple of officers stand at the end of my street in Tokyo. There they can easily catch motorists making an illegal right turn. The rule exists only at certain times of day making it very hard for motorists to comply.

The police know this and just wait there like a bear fishing for spawning salmon.

It seems so pointless. If the right turn is really a problem then mark it in such a way as to make compliance obvious. If not, then just allow it and stop enforcement.

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It's similar in Poland. It's against the law to cross the street on red light. Even if the street is completely empty of cars. So what police and city guard often do is hide somewhere in the bushes near universities and catch students trying to cross the street 'illegally'. It's an easy and safe way to bump up statistics and make some money off tickets. Unfortunately, in many cases, performance review for police is done on number of cases and money made off tickets rather than severity of crimes. As a result you have police bothering low hanging fruit in form of teenagers and avoiding the tough crimes like murderers and drug dealers.

I had one of these on my commute in Atlanta for a while. (Left turn) It was impossible to read the sign unless you came to a stop, at which point a cacophony of honking emerged from behind, whether it was the right time or not.

At some point they added a little yellow light to indicate it was legal to turn. I was a little awestruck.

I got a speeding in a school zone ticket and fought it because the points for that offence are high. The sign gave times the speed limit was in effect but I missed it and there were no other cars on the road so I didn't have that as a reference either. My lawyer argued that if the time of day was required knowledge there should have been a clock installed under the sign or some other visual alert. I got off.

My very first ticket, after I got my license in the mid-90's, was for the same thing -- but in Manhattan.

You lived in or near NYC and didn't know that right-on-red is illegal in the whole city, at all times? There's no possible confusion there (except maybe near the borders of the outer boroughs, but Manhattan is an island so pretty hard to claim you didn't know you were in the city).

Where did they say that they lived in NYC? Only that they got caught there.

That's why I said "or near". I figured it was common knowledge if you drive anywhere around the area. But it's true that it's not signed anywhere (that I know of), so if you're driving from farther away, it would be easy to get caught.

I lived in upstate NY and had no idea about this rule, and I visited NYC often.

I don't live in NYC, but I do drive through it every now and then. This is the first time I'm hearing about it. Good to know.

Back around 2003 or so I was in NYC visiting one of my fraternity brothers, and I made a right-on-red and he screams at me "Yooooooooo, what you doin?!?!" in his surprisingly thick NY accent for a guy originally from Shanghai. I had no clue that was illegal, it's not like they had signs stating it. I'm from Philly's NJ surburbs but I almost never drive up to NYC. Seems like a policy designed to easily ensnare out-of-town drivers.

Same thing. Seattle.

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